Half squats do not produce half the results. People are hang up about full squats.
We need to look at things differently. Remember that load=intensity. It is likely that with the greater loads experienced when lifting using half squats a greater amount of MUs are recruited. If we all agree that lifing weights is general, and all we are trying to do is recruit more muscle and stimulate the CNS; then we can’t go wrong. If we are hang up about technique for technique’s sake then lets not power clean but full squat clean, lets not power snatch but full snatch. I hope you can all see what I mean. Of course thats not to say that the full squat or partial squat doesn’t have a place in sprint training, its just that we shouldn’t be so hang up about ONE exercise method.
85% of 1RM will recruit all available motor units from the motor neuron pool. In some muscles this figure is as low as 50% of 1RM.
Further increase in expressed strength is mainly due to increased rate coding.
Half squats work well in many athletic scenarios, for they mimic very well the amplitude and direction of athletic movements, as well as the accentuated region of the force production. In this regard they will produce outstanding results. As mentioned before Dr Bodnarchuck uses them intensively with his high level athletes.
However, to be effective a half squat should be used with a greater load then a full squat. This requires a qualified athlete, with a decent level of preparedness , and a very strong muscle chain which is involved in the half squat.
For athletes which dont fulfill this requirement, full squat will produce more benefits. It will also build the required preparedness for more advanced training means.
actually if thats your support for doing half squat and quarter squats then method man was right because he did say that they have a purpose and a time. you imply that verk and bonderchcuk both reccomend that an athlete only do half squats when in reality its just another speciel means. they still have their athletes full squat. he made alot of good points certain muscles are not active when you do a partial squat. the movement, not the muscle is developed by doing the complete full movement. bodybuilders and people worrying about arm size train muscle athletes train movements.
But James, half squats (to parallel) do not just train the muscles, as you imply, they train strength over a very specific ROM to jumping. Sure, full squats provide strength over the bottom end of the range of motion, but this is a useless position for most athletes.
Also, I do know that Verkhoshansky and Bondarchuk use full squats with their athletes as well. However, as far as I am aware, they are only employed when competition is still a ways away.
On a personal note, I have always full squatted and will probably continue to do so. I recognize that the half squat, along with assistance work, is a more effective means for my goals, but I feel the chance of injury is too high so I avoid it.
RJ,
Why do you think it matters that they develop strength over a specific ROM if squatting itself is non-specific to sporting movements? Even if you were looking to improve strength over the specific ROM, hasn’t full ROM strength work been shown to improve strength over every part of the ROM?
I think it matters that strength is developed over a specific ROM because the single best predictor of power absorbtion is force absorbtion/strength (JackM has touched on this). Most sporting activities (jumping, running, etc.) generate the highest amount of force during the ammortization phase, not at toe off as is incorrectly assumed by many, and therefore power absorbtion in that ROM is very important.
As for your second point, squatting deep (or performing any lift to the bottom of the movement) does increase strength over the entire ROM proportionately. However, using more weight over a smaller ROM provides greater strength gains over the trained joint angles and lesser strength gains over the untrained joint angles. So, unless the bottom of the ROM is actively needed in one’s sport, full squats may be superfluous. Still though, as a general strengthening tool, I feel they are unsurpassed.
I’m a sprinter (100M), and not a very good one at that.
As for injury, I’m speaking about in the weightroom. My lower back has always limited me in the squat rack and so reducing my ROM and loading up the weight never seemed like a good idea.
even though the motion in the bottom portion of a squat is “useless”, or not “sport specific”, going lower developes the glutes, a very important muscle for sprinters, better than a 1/4 squat would.
The full squat does train the glutes better than a half squat would, but it should not be your only weight exercise. As they say, train movements, not muscles. Since this is the case, the glutes would get plenty of stimulation during hip extension exercises. It’s best not to compromise your knee extension exercise by worrying about how much it involves hip extension (which should be trained in a different way).
I would think that in the first video, there could be much stress on the knee-posterior cartilage, in particular. I think that for athletes, squatting, as with all lifting in general, is a means to an end. I’m not going to have my athletes go that low, and risk injury, but we approach that depth.
It’s our job as S+C professionals to help athletes decide the whole risk/reward thing with exercise selection.
Stopping short of “butt to the floor” makes sense to me, we squat parallel, but we also do waves of lower box squats and above-thigh-parallel squats.
“training movements” is key- as nothing that we do in the weight room is truly sport specific- only playing the sport is.
from an organizational standpoint the ability of an athelete to generate power around the hip is more important that around the knee. dont get me wrong knee extension and flexion must be trained but hip extension and flexion should be the core of your lower body training as the levers for the muscles of the hip ar much longer and the muscles are at a greater mechanical disadvantage. that is why naturally these muscles tend to be bigger than those around the knee the same goes. the more distal the muscle the less force is required to move its segment the more proxmal a muscle the greater the mechanical disadvantage. the shoulder is a perfect example when the arm is extended and a external weight is held the deltoids must create a force sometimes 20 times greater than the weight just to maintain equillibrium, it depends on the length of the individuals arm (or rather the moment arm of the deltoid and the longer moment arm of the load acting on a point of rotation, the glenohumeral joint)
the onyl real problem with this is what if in the athletic event they need to create force in an extreme joint range? neurologically they wont be able to produce a large force. the muscle is there but the neurologcal control patterns arent. same goes for people who use straps, belts and suits. what happens when you dont have that gear or when you are creating forces using thos same muscles on the feild of play. the forces experience running and jumping are far greater than those experienced in a max squat so if you cant maintin interabdominal pressure by contraction of T.A. in a max squat how do you expect to maintain that force during the a sprint or jump or whatever your doing?
Interesting topic. I’m of the oppinion that deep squats are better, for the following reason: Deep squats put more emphasis on Glutes and Hams, rather than quads. I believe this is the correct emphasis for a sprinter. James supports this with an argument based on the mechanics of sprinitng action, and I would add this: The fact that sprinters are crying out for stronger hams and glutes is highlighted by the relative occurance of hamstring injuries (as opposed to quad injuries). (How many more sprinters do you know who have pulled their hams…?)
It was said above:
“It’s best not to compromise your knee extension exercise by worrying about how much it involves hip extension”
but I would turn this around and say that you shouldn’t compromise what is probably your best hip extension exercise by worring about knee extension.
for you people that think having a big squat is worthless, what you think about the comment below.
“What I see in much of the liturature, is that absolute strength is only so important and then after a certain point it is worthless, this is FALSE. Why???, because where is the time component???, What Im saying is that in Boyles articles and others, they say a 500lb squat is useless, but is it at .8m/s/”??? Matt Wenning
Here’s some statements for the forum to pick apart;
I read somewhere that full squats are no good for runners becuase it may cuase the gluteals to slack slightly when you are in an upright position such as running. The text suggested you want to keep the gluteals relatively tight becuase the glutes help torso stay upright when your foot is on the ground.
On the other hand I read that full squats do more for gluteal development than parallel squats. (exception may be the box suat and powerlifter stlye squat that obviously do a lot for gluteals and more than conventional parallel squat.)
3.) I read heavy parallel gives more c.n.s fatigue than full squat. But should this be read as parallel giving better c.n.s simulation = posative, or more interuption to how you spread your energies in training = negative?
How much muscle stretch is there in full sprint stride compared to parallel and full squats and is this even relevant?
Parallel squats require more assistant exercises to be enhanced. E.g, reverse hypers, glute-hams and/or other are honestly needed to boost your parallel squat.
The same can not be said off full squats which just don’t seem to need many assistant exercises at all.
Some people favour full squat becuase the folding of the leg is greater. Some people imply this leads to smoother and easier folding of leg in the sprint stride - supple quadraceps. Parallel squats do not develope that quality (Is it a quality that can be developed in strength exercises?)
Some people think the best thing about lifting weights for an athlete is that they make athletic movements smoother. Even this can be sub-devided;
A; Smoother becuase neural pathways for the movements have been highly tuned?
B; Smoother becuase a strong (thru full posible range of motion)and supple muscle might relax MORE in recovery phase of sprint stride.
Would this lean toward full squats?
If we look a the shapes of the hip/thigh in world class sprinters we can see;
Big chaffing thighs from particularly big adductor muscles.
Big hammies.
Not big lower quads.
Upper outer thigh contours stick out a fair bit.
Very developed gluteals.
Tyson Gay is an excellant example but which type of squat might help this developement.
I have noticed that sprints do as much for my upper thigh mass as any weights exercise of simmilar % intensity & volume parameter.
Opinion on any of above statements I look forward to reading aswell.(aswell as what has allready been written.)
I’m particularly interested in statement n.o 1.
PS. I checked up on single leg exercises (dont like them) and step ups, seem to work for Asafa. I think they would be good on a higher platform targeting the hamstrings.
